It was another rehearsed move from Bragman which was our final undoing. On the hour Rovers set up an attack after we'd kicked directly into touch. The ball went right, courtesy of Bragman, with full back Ryan Foreman charging throuigh on a run to his left. Bragman's diagonal kick bamboozling the West defence to allow Foreman to touch down to give his side a 19-14 lead, which had looked unlikely until then.

After the earliest of early setbacks, and with Owen Nugent already limping off, the West pack had pulled its sleeves up and taken  the game to their bigger counterparts.

The scrum was being dominated by the red, green and white shirts, although there was a highly unusual temporary lull when we went to uncontested scrums  after just a quarter of an hour. Referee Revis Phillips was quick to punish any "not tens" with Dylan Langley going to the bin as we forced a series of penalties. Hooker Jamie Montgomery soon followed for the same offence at which point it was realised that Rovers didn't have any front rows on their bench. Langley was their designated replacement front row and he was already serving a sentence - from which he couldn't be recalled.

That certainly didn't help our set piece, but it could be argued that up against 13 men for eight or so minutes we should have taken advartage. It wasn't to be. We pressed and pressed with Lewis Scott almost going over a couple of times in the right corner. However, Rovers were resolute in their defence.

Our try finally came  courtesy of Adam Coates when we were back to 15 a side. We turned down a shot at the posts after yet another penalty - such was the dominance of our scrum at this point. The ball was duly secured and after several phases Coates ran a strong line to go over from close range with Heron levelling the scores.

Unfortunately,  the full back was just short with a penalty shortly after the restart

But, with the weather worsening, we finally went ahead.  Adam Brown was the scorer after a series of attacks in what used to be called the Steetley corner. Again he went over from close range as forward after forward had tried their luck - Sam taking the score to 14-7 in our favour.

The next score would be an important one. It went to Rovers as their set-piece achieved more stability and they forced their way over. The missed kick kept us in the lead by just two points, but it wasn't to last as Messrs Bragman and Foreman outfoxed our defence with that diagonal kick.

Sam Heron did bring  the score back to 19-17, as he slotted a scrum penalty, only for the the home side to reply with a penalty of their own.

There were were still hopes that a grandstand finish would lead to a match-winning converted try.  It wasn't to be and to add insult to injury word from across town was that a depleted Stags side had gone down 47-10 to the Heughers.

Let's hope for a merrier Christmas courtesy of two good training sessions this week and a win against Ponteland at Brinkburn next Saturday.

Rovers: Ryan Foreman, Michael Railton, Steve Barnfield (capt), Jack Gunn, James Keers, Josh Bragman, Matt Stephenson, Jamie Montgomery, Kevin Lawson, Ian Pinchen, Joe Little, Dylan Langley, Andrew Dring, Liam Armstrong, Daniel Charters.

West: Sam Heron, Jake Tennant,  Will Hilditch, Zac Southern, Lewis Scott, Stu Waites, Ryan Pinater (capt), Adam Coates, ASidan Jackson-Smith, Adam Brown, Jake Linighan, Will Corbett, Owen Nugent, Liam Bailey, Scott Butcher.